New York Public Library

second-time ASB host
see nypl.org

Seven SI students worked at the New York Public Library (NYPL) for ASB 2004. Three students were at the Science, Industry and Business Library (SIBL) and four others spent their time at the Humanities & Social Sciences Library.

At SIBL, the students were given tours of various areas of the library and also had the chance to speak with a number of different employees about their specific jobs and the history of the library.

At SIBL, Joanna Axelrod, among other things, researched the paper holdings of core industry and trade journals in the University of Michigan and the University of Texas-Austin's catalogs, with the aim of developing a database of electronic images of these journals—many of which go back as far as the early 1800s. By determining which universities have which copies of each journal, SIBL is in a better position to determine the feasibility of the project and maybe at a later date solicit the involvement of the universities that hold those journals.

Stephanie Lichtenauer divided her time at SIBL between observing operations at the library information desks and sitting in on classes. She also updated a collection of materials on the SIBL website by double checking items: their call numbers, the number of years they have been available in the catalog and on the shelves etc.

Students at the Humanities & Social Sciences Library worked in four different divisions.

Throughout the week, Jeanie Fisher was given seven tours of the library that proved instructive as an overview of the many research divisions in the library. Jeanie also "shadowed" librarians on the reference desk, and observed two classes arranged specifically for students from the New School and NYU, respectively. Both classes introduced students to general library resources and those specific to their respective courses of study. In addition, she found bibliographic records for about 20 rare books that had been recently donated to the library and that needed to be added to the catalog.

Laura Schmidt spent her week in the Berg Collection where she compared the contents of the Kenneth Koch archive to the box contents listing, filled in details on the contents and corrected mistakes made during prior processing.

In the Wallach Division of Arts, Andrea Gietzen created accession records in CATNYP for a collection of artist-made books. To do this, Andrea had to first verify certain information in OCLC, RLC and a book distributor's website. Andrea also had the opportunity to attend a class on the history of printmaking, which was being given to a group of local undergraduates.

Allison Walker was the in Art and Architecture Division where she sorted "Artist's Files" that are comprised of information in various formats, including newspaper articles, photographs, gallery announcements, and original works of art. This sorting helped with determining whether to keep the information in the Artist's Files, with the Art Department where many patrons could examine them, or to move them to a more secure environment, such as with the Prints and Photographs division.

• “I think the aspect that had the greatest impact on me was realizing the scope of the jewels held by the New York Public Library.”
• “I saw students, filmmakers, photographers and armchair historians use the NYPL collections for resources that sometimes are not available anywhere else in the world—that was amazing to me, that this library has so many incredible materials in its collection that are not restricted to a privileged population (i.e. students, faculty, members of an academic community).”
• “My experience confirmed my desire to work in a special collections environment.”
• “I was able to glean pearls of wisdom from brief, matter-of-fact comments—for example, after one librarian calmly assured a woman that the brain of her dead husband was not, in fact, emanating from the top floor of the library, she told me 'you have to make sure you treat everyone with dignity while keeping your own. That can be a tricky balance.'”

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